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Drinkwater residents have to adapt or move

When I moved to Duncan I could carry my canoe across the highway and wheelbarrow garden trimmings across Sherman Road. Try doing that now.

When I moved to Duncan I could carry my canoe across the highway and wheelbarrow garden trimmings across Sherman Road. Try doing that now.

Our cozy little community has grown and some of our quiet residential streets have become very busy thoroughfares. Not what some of us would have liked but a reality just the same.

Now a very few residents of a short stretch of Drinkwater Road would like to preserve their “English Country” atmosphere and interrupt or close Drinkwater for the use of non-residents. At one end of Drinkwater you have the largest shopping complex in the Valley and at the other end you have possibly the biggest recycling depot on southern Vancouver Island as well as one of the largest highway and road maintenance operations. The use of Drinkwater should have been thought of by North Cowichan before these large entities were put in place.

Do you think the police will want to detour once the new police station is in place on Drinkwater? The shortest distance between the new station and the Lake Cowichan Highway will be along Drinkwater.

The majority of affected properties are large rural parcels with most of the driveways being 30 metres or longer. What a luxury! As well, I think that there are few, if any, young children living in this area, so if standard municipal speed limits are observed and enforced, safety should not be much of an issue. And where will the traffic move to? Probably to Auchinachie which, when I drive along it, has at times many baby buggies and children playing either on or near the road. Not to mention the school zone at the north end of Auchinachie which you would be forcing more impatient drivers to go through.

What do you think the long-time residents of so many streets in our community had to do when their roads became very busy and noisy? Adapt or move.

 

Sean P. Napier

Duncan